


It's All Right If You Love Me (It's All Right If You Don't)

by Nightdog_Barks



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Episode Related, Gen, Introspection, Road Trip, Thailand
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-10-14
Updated: 2009-10-14
Packaged: 2017-10-18 07:32:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/186472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nightdog_Barks/pseuds/Nightdog_Barks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thirteen thinks over what was and what is to be. 475 words.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's All Right If You Love Me (It's All Right If You Don't)

**Title:** It's All Right If You Love Me (It's All Right If You Don't)  
 **Author:** [](http://nightdog-writes.livejournal.com/profile)[**nightdog_writes**](http://nightdog-writes.livejournal.com/)  
 **Characters:** Remy Hadley (Thirteen).  
 **Rating:** PG-13  
 **Warnings:** None.  
 **Spoilers:** Yes, for episode 6.05, "Instant Karma"  
 **Summary:** Thirteen thinks over what was and what is to be. 475 words.  
 **Disclaimer:** Don't own 'em. Never will.  
 **Author Notes:** I do not speak the language referenced in this fic, so the phrases used here are from one of those "useful language tips" sites, noted at the end. Please do point out any errors -- I really do appreciate it! The title and LJ-cut text are taken from the Tom Petty song [Breakdown](http://www.metrolyrics.com/breakdown-lyrics-tom-petty.html).  
 **Beta:** My intrepid First Readers.

 **It's All Right If You Love Me (It's All Right If You Don't)**

  
It takes more time than she thought possible to get from New York to Bangkok. As she looks out the window at the Pacific Ocean below, she thinks about that time, the fleeting hours she'll never get back.

 _Maybe,_ she thinks, _hours spent at forty-two thousand feet in the air don't really count._

"Like the calories in the chocolate cake you eat standing over the sink?" House's smirking voice is clear in her mind. "Yeah, good luck with that."

Forty-two thousand feet up, Remy smiles.

* * *

In Thailand there are people who look like Kutner. People who look like Eric. People who look like bamboo swaying in the breeze. There aren't that many who look like House.

* * *

It's the ninth lunar month of the Chinese calendar, so she goes to Phuket for the Vegetarian Festival. She stands in front of a sign -- _Tourist Information Activities_ \-- and rereads the rules as young men carrying yellow banners pass by.

 _No meat eating.  
No sex.  
Cleanliness of bodies during the festival.  
Pragnant ladies should not watch any ritual._

Her eyes linger on the next-to-last line.

 _People at mourning period should not attend the festival._

"You're behaving like an idiot," House says from somewhere just above her left ear.

"Shut up," she mumbles. "And get out of my head."

* * *

She learns to say _"Sawadee kaa"_ as a universal greeting, to press the palms of her hands together in the ubiquitous gesture of politeness and honor the Thai call _wai_. It echoes the English word _why?_ and she finds herself connecting the word with the act, questioning everything. From ordering a bottle of cold water ( _nam yen_ ) to looking for a toilet ( _hong nam yu nai?_ ), from saying thank you ( _kob khun ka_ ) to gently fending off the young men who smile shyly at her and tell her she's pretty ( _"Khun na rak mak"_ ), she clasps her hands and thinks _why?_

 _"Khun mi fen leu mai?"_ a man in the hotel lounge murmurs, and she doesn't understand so she asks him to say it again, slower. He switches to English instead.

"Do you have a boyfriend?"

"No," Remy says. _"Mai."_

* * *

It's sunny, so she goes to the beach. The waves are calming, almost hypnotic as they roll over the soft white sand.

She stretches out on a long towel and thinks about nothing. After a while a cloud covers the sun and she falls asleep.

"Come back," Eric says. "I love you."

"You fired me," she says.

"Because we would have torn each other apart otherwise. I was saving us. From ourselves."

"You were wrong," she says, and wakes up. She sits up, slowly. A bird calls once, somewhere out over the sea.

 _"Sawadee kaa,"_ Remy whispers, and presses the palms of her hands together.

  
~ fin

  
 _Notes:_  
The Vegetarian Festival is real. More details can be found [here](http://www.phuketvegetarian.com/index_eg.htm), including the "10 Rules" and the line regarding "pragnant ladies."  
[This](http://www.rawaimuaythai.com/Thai_language.html) is the "helpful phrases" site I used.


End file.
